[arin-discuss] ipv6 technology supplier phone bank?

[Tony Hain]

Lee Howard wrote:
> > From: Tony Hain <alh-ietf at tndh.net>
> > To: Paul Vixie <vixie at isc.org>
> > Cc: arin-discuss at arin.net
> > Sent: Monday, September 28, 2009 3:58:43 PM
> > Subject: Re: [arin-discuss] ipv6 technology supplier phone bank?
> >
> > At the end of the day, the CIOs and their architects need to earn
> their keep
> 
> Enterprise CIOs, or ISP architects?  They have different problems with
> IPv6.

Yes their problems are different, but both need to get on with it.

> 
> > by developing real 3-5 year plans that show the overall costs, and
> stop
> > ignoring the cost of keeping IPv4 running as 'the cost of doing
> business'.
> > Deploy CGNs (oh wait those cost money too, and the operational costs
> of
> > diagnostics will be much higher than people expect ...), break IPv4
> as
> > people know it, then charge extra to put it back for those willing to
> pay.
> 
> ISPs will break IPv4 for their paying customers, and charge to put it
> back
> together?    Brilliant!
> Especially if the guy down the street hasn't broken it yet.[1]

It is not my plan, it is what the ISPs have backed themselves into by
stalling their IPv6 deployments. Just about every ISP is looking for a CGN
(even those that claim a religious bias against nat as a technology),
because that is the only path they have left themselves at this point. It is
not a matter of who has the largest total IPv4 pool today, it is who is the
last one to draw from the RIR and have the longest run of new unused space
once the panic sets in. Yes the larger historical blocks have some wiggle
room, but that reshuffle has a cost as well.

> 
> > In other words, make the price for IPv4 service align with the costs
> that
> > will be incurred to keep it running. Yes IPv6 deployment has a cost,
> but the
> > sooner it can be demonstrated that the cost for keeping IPv4 on life
> support
> > vastly exceeds that, the sooner work can begin on getting the
> replacement in
> > place.
> 
> How do you align those costs?
> If IPv6 requires a new home gateway but IPv4 only requires part of a
> CGN,
> which is cheaper?  Who incurs the cost? [2]

If you look at the CGN deployment plans, they all require a new home gateway
anyway. 

> 
> If IPv6 doesn't require a new home gateway, but only gets you to 50% of
> the Internet, which is cheaper?  Answer:  both is cheaper than one or
> the
> other:  use CGN for IPv4-only traffic (so you don't lose customers,
> except
> the stuff CGN breaks), use native IPv6 where possible (so you don't pay
> for their CGN).  Cap and grow if you can.

Should have been done years ago, too late now. 

> 
> Bonus questions:  What applications does your CGN break?  Are you using
> CGN, dual-stack light, A+P, or portrange?  When will you need this in
> your
> network, how long will it take to test it, and how long will it take to
> build the
> provisioning and operational systems around it?

CGN will break just about everything but simple html and pop, and can't
begin to scale in the face of the AJAX fad. It really doesn't matter which
one you pick, you are just trading off which apps break, and how much the
new home router is going to cost.

> 
> Lee
> 
> [1]  Notice whether IPv4 is broken for existing customers or only new
> customers.  

This is a very short term viewpoint. It doesn't take a Nobel prize winner to
figure out that the existing customers will be screwed over just like the
new ones in short order  'just because you can'. There will be lots of
make-work shuffling the old customers into the new model and back when they
complain, just to figure out which ones are using apps that care. 


> What happens to competition if users can't switch providers
> and receive a comparable IPv4 service?

This question makes it sound like somebody cares about competition.... ;)
There is not going to be a 'comparable IPv4 service', no matter how you want
to define that, once the free pool is gone. 

> [2]  Important question.  Also important is, "Who are they paying, and
> what
> does their ROI look like?"  Are CPE vendors thinking, "If I don't
> support
> IPv6 until 2012, then all my consumers will have to buy new gear from
> me
> again when they're forced into IPv6"?

I have no idea what CPE vendors are thinking (including the Linksys team
which I try to motivate), but I really doubt they will hear IPv6 from
consumers, while the ISPs have not been telling the CPE vendors that they
need IPv6 capable cpe until very recently, and most ISPs haven't done that
yet. CPE vendors run on very thin margins, so they are not even going to
start thinking about IPv6 until they get very clear indications from the
ISPs as to what is needed. So far the few messages I am aware of are; not
coherent; nothing more than an acronym; have not clear timeframes or orders
... YMMV


Tony